Year by year the number of returnees in Georgia, who get back through various channels appears to be rising and the most challenging issues for them are reintegration and lack of employment. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) in close cooperation with the local governments supports numerous economic and community revitalization initiatives to help migrants’ smooth adaptation and create job opportunities for them.   

To plan and execute various community revitalization activities, IOM implements serious works in multiple directions including selecting the target municipalities, meeting and working in close cooperation with the target municipalities leaderships to outline the collaboration prospects, evaluating the migration attitude exciting in the migrant-affected areas, conducting baseline household surveys in the selected communities in all the pilot municipalities to identify the needs, analyze the attitudes towards mobility as well as perspectives and potentials for community revitalization etc. As a result of this, the selected community projects reflect the priorities identified by local inhabitants.  

Kitskhi Igoreti village of Kharagauli municipality is one of those target areas, where in the frames of IOM “Sustainable Reintegration and Community Revitalization Pilot Initiative in Communities of Return” project, with the close cooperation and financial contribution from the local authorities much needed drinking water well was arranged.

“Igoreti is one of the villages in our municipality with the highest migration tendency. The lack of drinking water supply there used to be a huge unsolved problem for many years. It should be noted that such inconvenience was also provoking unstoppable inbound of outbound migration, the locals were leaving their houses and moving to seek better life conditions. In this very moment IOM Georgia contacted us and offered a helping hand, which was vital for us, a great relief. We agreed with great pleasure and with joint efforts and financial contribution we managed to finalize this much necessary community initiative – arranged drinking water well in Igoreti village. This integral activity will definitely decrease the migration process and will give a chance to the locals to improve their living conditions,” said Kharagauli Municipality Mayor Koba Lursmanashvili.   

Through IOM and Kharagauli municipality joint efforts, after implementation of the community initiative, now up to 170 families already have drinking water, improving the quality of their lives and contributing to the community revitalization.

International Organization for Migration (IOM) implemented “Sustainable Reintegration and Community Revitalization Pilot Initiative in Communities of Return” project, through the financial support of International Development Fund (IDF) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) in 2020-2023.

Photo by IOM Georgia